Abstract: Russian Military Capability in a Ten-Year Perspective – 2019Una Hakvåg (Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI)) reviews Russian Military Capability in a Ten-Year Perspective – 2019, an analysis of Russia's Armed Forces and their fighting power, edited by Fredrik Westerlund & Susanne Oxenstierna.
Abstract: Russia's operationalization of a sphere of interest in the South CaucasusA central foreign policy objective of Russia is to maintain an exclusive sphere of interest in its post-Soviet neighbourhood. This article analyses how Russia employs a combination of political and military instruments in operationalizing its perceived sphere of interest in the still conflict-ridden South Caucasus. Russia is the only external power in the region to have military bases there, and is the only one seemingly ready to undertake military action. At present, Russia appears satisfied with the status quo in the South Caucasus. The unresolved conflicts in Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Nagorno-Karabakh are therefore unlikely to be resolved in the near future. Unresolved conflicts suit Russia's objectives. Russian military bases in Georgia and Armenia provide Moscow with both a key lever against Tbilisi and Yerevan and a structural advantage for potential Russian military operations in the region. Russia's military posture in the Caucasus is relevant to the potential for large-scale conflict in the Southern war theatre, including the wider Middle East, and not just local conflicts in the Caucasus.
Abstract: Russia's Defence Policy and Military Presence in the Caucasus and Central AsiaThese two reports, Security in the Caucasus. Russian policy and military posture and Security in the Caucasus. Russian policy and military posture, analyse and discuss Russia's security policy and military posture after 2014 in two regions often described as part of Russia's 'near abroad', the Caucasus and Central Asia. The reports find that although both regions are considered as within Russia's 'sphere of influence', the Russian military structure and policy varies significantly. While geared towards crisis management of potential conflicts in Central Asia, the frozen conflicts in the South Caucasus have made Russia set up for regional war.
Russia as a Military Power, edited by Niels Bo Poulsen and Jørgen Staun (Djøf Forlag 2021) is reviewed by Tor Bukkvoll, of the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI).
Niels Bo Poulsen, director of the Department of Military History and War Studies at the Royal Danish Defence College, reviews Industry, War and Stalin's Battle for Resources: The Arctic and the Environment by Lars Rowe.
Nexus of Patriotism and Militarism in Russia er en viktig artikkelsamling om den russiske militærpatriotismens mange fasetter. Forfatterne forklarer grunnlaget for alliansen mellom «patrioter» og «militarister» internt i statsmaskineriet, og hvordan denne alliansen bruker fiendebilder i sitt forsøk på å presse gjennom en konsensus ovenfra og ned.
Nexus of Patriotism and Militarism in Russia is an important collection of articles about many aspects of military patriotism in Russia. The authors explain the foundation for an alliance between "patriots" and "militarists" within the state apparatus, and how this alliance uses enemy images in an attempt to force through a consensus top down.
Abstract: 'Have we ever been European?' Everyday reflections from Russia on the gender and sexuality 'culture wars'Drawing on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in European Russia, Jeremy Morris examines everyday attitudes to homosexuality in Russia, and the linkage to an understanding of terpimost (or 'tolerantnost') – 'tolerance' – as an insincere 'Euro-American' attitude. In this companion-piece to work focusing on male homophobia and conservative attitudes to childrearing (Morris & Garibyan, 2021), the focus is on how women describe their experience of same-sex relations and their heteronormative attitudes towards what they understand as 'non-normative' sexuality. Whereas the influence of Russia's state-led policy of conservatism is reflected in everyday talk – especially in relation to the idea that Euro-American values of permissiveness and 'tolerance' are misplaced – the findings reveal more nuanced ideas 'from below' about cultural differences between Russia and the putatively 'other' Europe. The article further notes the volatility and variance in survey methods that seek to measure 'intolerance' and cultural difference. They can exacerbate what, as Katherina Wiedlack and others have pointed out, is a colonial and orientalizing discourse that features an 'enlightened' West and a 'passive, backward' East. This article shows how 'intolerance' and acceptance of non-normative sexuality in Russia do not differ greatly from the situation in comparable societies of the global North.
Abstract in English"That kind of mother": Stigmatisation by the Russian child protection servicesHow does stigma influence the extent to which the child protection services in Russia undertake preventative work with vulnerable families in order to avoid taking the child out the family? Based on an analysis of previous research and my own fieldwork from St. Petersburg and Moscow, I note the gap between expectations towards vulnerable families, and their actual living conditions and potential for meeting these expectations. This gap results in a stigmatising categorisation of families who find themselves marginalised as neblagopolutsjnye – socially disadvantaged. Although Russia's officially 'family-oriented' child protection system is expected to base its work on objective methods, stigmatisation influences the decisions of social workers, making the system risk-oriented in practice. This is due to little or inadequate specialised education among social workers, resulting in the strong presence of the human factor: subjective, non-professional evaluations are made. With scant intersectional cooperation among state actors, there is little space to counteract or modify subjective evaluations. Thus, stigmatisation serves to limit the extent to which vulnerable families in Russia receive help, thus creating and upholding 'social orphanhood'.
Danish images of Russia in the 2010sThis article surveys how the editorial columns of five leading Danish newspapers treat Russia in the 2010s, building on an earlier study which focused on the first decade of the 2000s (Hansen 2010). The present study finds that the overall negative trajectory associated with Russia has continued, even grown more pronounced. In response, a minority position has developed on the fringes of political life in Denmark, holding that Russia is being demonized and that media coverage is too negative and essentially one-sided. The Danish newspapers surveyed focus on what is seen as an increasingly aggressive Russia violating borders and other established norms, and threatening its neighbours. The editorials reflect the gradual paradigm shift in views of Russia. They now speak openly of the need for Denmark to protect itself and its allies militarily against possible Russian aggression and to prevent Russia from wielding more power through its energy supplies to Europe, including supplies that traverse Danish territorial waters. Other topics in focus include Russia's invasion and subsequent annexation of Crimea, its involvement in the war in Eastern Ukraine as well as its military campaign in Syria.
Den lange kolde krig: Russiske og amerikanske fjendebilleder i 200 år redovisar hur politiker och intellektuella i de två supermakterna uppfattade motparten. Anne Mørk presenterar amerikanska bilder av Ryssland som främmande. Erik Kulavig berättar om den motsägelsefull relationen till USA som en del av Rysslands moderna historia. USA representerade det moderna i sig. Sovjetunionen ville bli modernt. Det kalla kriget mellan USA och Sovjetunionen var asymmetriskt.
Den lange kolde krig: Russiske og amerikanske fjendebilleder i 200 år (The Long Cold War: Two Centuries of Russian and American Enemy Images) is a study of how politicians and intellectuals in the two states perceived one another. Anne Mörk shows that those in the USA saw the USSR as strange and outlandish. Erik Kulavig tells of contradictory relations with the USA as part of the modern history of Russia. The USA stood out as the incarnation of modernity, and the USSR was striving to become modern. The Cold War between the two was asymmetric.
